Mudkip's current role in the team was split between protector and scout. Using its species' natural sharp senses, Mudkip could detect unusual energy shifts within a wide area. Whether it was sniffing out something hidden or staying on alert, Mudkip was a natural at both. Whenever Mudkip gave a warning cry, Nova always took it seriously.
But this time, it was clear that Mudkip had not spotted a threat. All Nova had to do was take off his backpack and look inside to understand exactly why Mudkip was crying out.
The incubator, which had been tucked in the same bag as Mudkip, was now glowing with a soft white light. Inside it, the Pokemon egg - half stone-gray and half water-blue - was rocking gently within the glow.
Nova had helped with Sprigatito's hatching before, so he knew right away what this meant. The little Lapras was about to hatch.
There was no question of continuing to travel that night. Nova quickly had Sprigatito find a flat patch of ground and set up camp and a tent on the spot.
Around that time, the Corviknight that had been gliding through the sky finally felt hungry and returned to ask Nova for food. Nova quickly sorted out dinner for all of his partners, then settled inside the tent and sat watching the glowing egg without looking away.
At 7:41 in the evening, the white light from the egg suddenly flared, filling the entire tent like a Flash had gone off inside it. The whole egg seemed to melt into something like liquid silver, then slowly took shape again within the glow.
As the light faded, the newborn Lapras lay quietly on the soft pad at the bottom of the incubator. It looked like a tiny blue sea turtle. Compared to a full-grown Lapras, this one was barely bigger than a dinner plate. Its eyes were shut as if it were still asleep, and small, soft cries slipped from its little mouth.
Nova carefully lifted the glass cover. Earlier, he had set a baby bottle to warm against Growlithe's fur, which always radiated heat like a sun-warmed stone. He gently placed the warm bottle beside Lapras's mouth.
The moment Lapras caught the scent of Moomoo Milk, its eyes opened. It latched onto the bottle and, in almost no time at all, drained it completely.
It made sense, really. A Lapras needs to grow from the size of a dinner plate to something large enough to carry several people across open water, and it has only a few months to do it. The energy that takes is hard to imagine.
Without a doubt, this was another Pokemon that would eat through Nova's savings fast.
As the saying goes, a growing child eats more than a grown adult. A Pokemon growing at this pace could not be shortchanged on food.
Part of the reason Nova had been carrying so many bags on this trip was exactly this. A large share of the load was food for his Pokemon, which naturally included everything a newborn, big-eating Lapras would need.
Nova fed Lapras three bottles of Moomoo Milk to start. It was not fresh milk, of course. Thanks to advances in food technology, ranches across the Norlandia Alliance had developed Moomoo Milk powder. It was expensive - a two-kilogram tin cost over 30,000 League coins - but it kept over 99% of the nutrients from fresh milk, and took up far less space than crates of bottles. For a trainer traveling on foot, that made a real difference.
Nova was not short on money at the moment, so the tin he had brought was a premium one, costing close to 50,000 coins. To put that in perspective, all the money he had made selling gemstones a while back could buy about twenty tins at most.
Raising Pokemon had always been a money pit. There was simply no upper limit to what you could spend if you chose to.
If your Pokemon was something like Sprigatito, which ate small amounts each meal, things stayed manageable. But with a big eater, you could only hope for the best.
This was exactly why, even though Nova had always been fond of Snorlax, he had never seriously thought about raising one. A Snorlax did not eat food. It ate its trainer's savings.
Making the milk was simple enough. He had Mudkip use a gentle Water Gun to fill the kettle, then had Growlithe use a light Ember to heat it. Traveling with Pokemon had that advantage. Many tools could be replaced by a well-trained partner. Water-type Pokemon served as portable water sources, Fire-type Pokemon replaced fire-starting gear, and Grass-type Pokemon could grow berries and wild vegetables when rations ran short. It was probably one of the reasons those three types were chosen as Starters to begin with.
Three bottles of milk only went so far, of course. In the wild, Lapras would normally eat a large amount of fish every day to meet its nutritional needs - and not just any fish, but fish-type Pokemon. That was part of why a growing Lapras population could put local fish Pokemon under serious pressure. Lapras were big eaters, and picky ones too.
In captive breeding, however, lab-grown meat had largely solved the ingredient problem. All kinds of synthetic fish Pokemon meat were available on the market.
Still, Nova was not willing to start a newborn on synthetic food. He had spent a fair sum buying several bags of dried Veluza fillet, made from premium cuts shed cleanly through the move Fillet Away. At the moment, this was the only fish Pokemon ingredient that could be bought legally in large quantities.
Synthetic meat could wait until Lapras was older. For now, natural food felt like the right choice.
As it turned out, Lapras preferred the dried Veluza over the sweet milk. Watching the little one use its small milk teeth to work through pieces of dried fish nearly as large as itself, chewing and swallowing bit by bit, gave Nova a feeling he could not quite name. Something close to what a parent must feel watching their child eat well.
Lapras was a newborn, though, and its energy had limits. In the middle of eating, it lowered its tiny head and fell asleep. Even then, it did not let go of the fish in its mouth, its jaw still moving slowly as it dozed.
Nova felt his heart melt a little. Was there any Pokemon in the world as adorable as Lapras?
From outside the tent, Sprigatito made a sound of disgust. "Pah! Loving the new and forgetting the old!"